


Stay

by sg_wonderland



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-11-02 21:37:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10953216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sg_wonderland/pseuds/sg_wonderland
Summary: An AU where Jack and Sara are married and Daniel is, in effect, the other woman.





	Stay

**Author's Note:**

> The italicized words are from Sugarland’s song ‘Stay’, written by Jennifer Nettles.
> 
> The video for this song simply breaks my heart every time I see it. Jennifer Nettles is an amazing singer and an amazing songwriter. Although she swears it isn’t based on her life, she is so emotional and heartbroken as she performs that you wonder if she isn’t also an amazing actress. Go to You Tube, watch the video and see if you don’t agree with me.

Stay  
I’ve been sittin’ here staring  
At the clock on the wall  
And I’ve been laying here praying  
Praying she won’t call  
It’s just another call from home  
You’ll get it and be gone  
And I’ll be cryin’  
And I’ll be beggin’ you, baby  
Beg you not to leave  
But I’ll be here waiting  
With my heart on my sleeve  
Oh for the next time we’ll be here  
Seems like a million years  
And I think I’m dying

 

Dr. Daniel Jackson sighed as he glanced at the clock. He could have been working, should have been working; he owed his editor a manuscript by yesterday. And yet instead of being parked in front of his laptop, he was parked in front of a frozen clock waiting for someone who was supposed to have been here an hour ago. 

“Screw this.” He jumped up and slammed his way into his office. The book should have been wrapped up a week ago, but Jack had gotten an unexpected trip to London, a city Daniel hadn’t been to for so long that he threw caution to the wind and met him there for four days. Daniel had rediscovered The British Museum. Jack had spent his days in meetings and he’d spent the nights buried inside Daniel.

*

What do I have to do to make you see  
She can’t love you like me

“I’m sorry about yesterday.” Jack tucked the cell phone under his chin as he negotiated the road from Cheyenne Mountain.

“That’s okay, I understand,” Daniel numbly repeated the words he’d said so often. He hadn’t realized until now how many lies he’d told himself. Which was worst, he wondered idly, lying to others or lying to yourself? “I got some work done.” Actually, he’d worked for sixteen straight hours since there wasn’t any reason to go to bed.

“Really? That’s good, then.” Daniel opened his mouth to confess that he had finished the book and shipped a disc off to his publisher, on the verge of suggesting they celebrate when Jack interrupted him. “Listen, tonight’s not good for me. Sara’s got some family in town, you know?”

“Yes, I know.” Daniel answered quietly as he hung up. Slowly, he rose and walked to the bedroom of his rented loft. He had left LA, left his life there, to come here and….he swallowed hard….and prostitute himself for a stranger he’d met at a friend’s party.

Yes, he’d known Jack was married. Yes, he’d known he was in the military. And yes, he’d known Jack would never leave his wife for Daniel. He’d gone into this with his eyes wide open. 

Because he’d fallen in love instantly with the come-hither look, the warm brown eyes and the sexy smile. He’d left the party with Jack and less than an hour later, Jack was fucking him in a hotel room. 

He just never thought that he’d end up in a relationship so dysfunctional that he could be the star of one of his own bestsellers. Thank God he’d given up his practice years ago. How hypocritical would it be for him to give advice he couldn’t even follow?

Truthfully, you wouldn’t use the word ‘relationship’ to describe what went on between the two of them. Because it was always Daniel being fucked. Jack’s reasoning was that the military conducted surprisingly intense physical exams and the doctors would know he’d been engaging in homosexual practices that could get him kicked out of the military. So he fucked Daniel or was on the receiving end of a blow job. But it was always Jack in control.

*

Why don’t you stay  
I’m down on my knees  
I’m so tired of being lonely  
Don’t I give you what you need  
When she calls you to go  
There is one thing you should know  
We don’t have to live this way  
Baby why don’t you stay

“She’ll be leaving on Tuesday. I can be there by sixteen-hundred.”

Daniel scrolled through his phone. “That’s good for me. Shall I order dinner?”

“How about we have dinner later?” His tone was suggestive.

“Much later?” Daniel murmured.

*  
You keep telling me, baby  
There will come a time  
When you will leave her arms  
And forever be in mine  
But I don’t think that’s the truth  
And I don’t like being used  
And I’m tired of waiting  
It’s too much pain to have to bear  
To love a man you have to share

Daniel ended up cooking dinner, a complicated chicken and wine dish that wouldn’t suffer too much from being left in the oven to warm. He was just turning the oven down when he heard Jack’s key in the door. Right on time, he glanced at the digital clock on the stove before grabbing a beer out of the fridge for Jack and topping up his glass of wine. “Hey.” He tipped his face up for Jack’s kiss.

“Hey, yourself. Something smells delicious.” Jack kissed him again, deeper, thrusting with his tongue. “And you taste delicious.” His tongue swiped languidly across Daniel’s lower lip.

“The wine, it’s a Greek white.” Daniel had long abandoned any attempts to educate Jack’s palate, handing him the icy beer.

“I’m thinking it’s you.” Jack grabbed the beer in one hand, cricked a finger through one of Daniel’s belt loops and towed him toward the bedroom.

*  
Why don’t you stay  
I’m down on my knees  
I’m so tired of being lonely  
Don’t I give you what you need  
When she calls you to go  
There is one thing you should know  
We don’t have to live this way  
Baby why don’t you stay

“I thought you were going to be there two more days?” Jack frowned into the cell phone. Daniel silently rose, pulled on his jeans. “Measles, huh?” Daniel heard him chuckling as he softly closed the bedroom door.

*

I can’t take it any longer  
But my will’s getting stronger  
And I think I know just what I have to do  
I can’t waste another minute  
After all that I’ve put in it  
I’ve given you my best  
Why does she get the best of you  
So the next time you find  
You wanna leave her bed for mine

Why don’t you stay  
I’m up off my knees  
I’m so tired of being lonely  
You can’t give me what I need  
When she begs you not to go  
There is one thing you should know  
I don’t have to live this way  
Baby why don’t you stay

 

“Jack, it’s just two days. I have to go.”

“But, Daniel, I’ve got a free night. Sara’s going to a book club thing in Denver, staying with a friend.”

“I’m sorry, but I have to meet my publisher if my next book is going to be published on time. I’ll call you when I get back, shall I?”

“I guess.” His voice was as petulant as a child and Daniel fought to toughen his spine.

“I love you, Jack.”

“Yeah.” He hung up.

“Good-bye, Jack.” Daniel told the silent phone, his voice echoing throughout the loft. His heart jolted at the knock on the door. Knowing he was being the world’s biggest fool, he hurried over to answer it.

“Hey, you got something to ship.” A burly young man in brown smiled at him.

“Yes, thank you,” Daniel stood back and indicated the boxes stacked in the corner. “Yes, all of them.” He watched as they dollied the boxes up, signed where they told him and tipped them before they departed. Picking up his laptop, he gave the empty loft one last look before he firmly closed the door and locked it behind him.

*  
There is one thing you should know  
I don’t have to live this way  
Baby why don’t you stay

Wouldn’t Daniel be surprised, he thought, as he waited impatiently for the elevator. Lately, Daniel had been distracted, almost distant when they made love but Jack was after changing that. Sarah had gone to see her father for the weekend, Jack had begged off, citing work. 

Actually, he had two days downtime and plans for the bottle of champagne he had under his arm; it always took surprisingly little to get Daniel drunk. He was whistling softly as he unlocked the door, Daniel’s name freezing on his lips as he stopped in the doorway.

The living room was meticulously clean, swept free of the personal items Daniel had littered around since he’d moved in. Jack dropped the champagne bottle on one of the couches and raced to the bedroom. His heart was in his throat when he whipped open the closet door and found it achingly empty.

He slumped onto the bed, Daniel’s scent lingering in the air.

*

“Well, Daniel, I have to tell you, this is plainly your best book to date.” Polly’s smile threatened to split her face. “The rewrite was fabulous. I’m glad you insisted on it, I’ll never doubt you again.”

“Thank you, Polly.” Daniel glanced out the window at the lights of LA, not meeting her eyes.

“It’s beautiful, Daniel. Fierce and honest, brutally so in places. I don’t know why you don’t go back into counseling.” She probed gently.

He shook his head vehemently. “That’s never going to happen. Ever. I can’t be a therapist ever again. My life, I’ve made so many mistakes, I’m not qualified to tell anyone how to live. Hell, writing books about relationships is so hypocritical that it’s a wonder I haven’t been struck down by now.” His voice became bitter.

“Daniel? Something I need to know?” Polly frowned at him, searching his face. “Did someone break your heart while you were off on your sabbatical? Do I need to go kick some woman’s ass?”

Daniel forced a smile. “No, you don’t need to kick any woman’s ass. I’m..” The Looney Tunes melody piped out of his phone. “Sorry.” He looked at the number and gently laid the phone back down.

“Not going to answer that?”

“Wrong number.” Daniel lied softly.

*

Sara was surprised when she unlocked the door, rolling her suitcase behind her. The lights were out, but there was a glow coming from the living room. Abandoning her suitcase, she locked up, dropped her sweater and padded softly down the steps.

There were candles all over the room, a fire in the fireplace, a bottle of champagne in a bucket on the coffee table. She picked the bottle up in surprise, she didn’t know he knew a thing about good champagne. “Jack?”

“Hey.” He sneaked down the steps behind her.

She jumped. “Oh, you scared me. What’s all this?”

He took her in his arms. “Just glad to have you home.”


End file.
